Phil Anastasia: The biggest loser is a true winner in life

Hedley "Sandy" Thame doesn't know or care how many wrestling matches he has lost as Camden's coach.

"Don't remind me," Thame said before another one Wednesday night at Eastern.

Camden's loss, 60-15 to Eastern, was the 543d of Thame's career. That sounds bad. Actually, it's good.

Think how good of a coach you have to be to lose more than 500 times. Think what that staggering total of setbacks says about your longevity, resiliency, fortitude.

Winning more than 500 might be easier, and just four coaches have done that in South Jersey history. But none of them have been asked to return to the wrestling room - day after day, season after season, decade after decade - and teach a handful of inexperienced athletes the intricacies of the most demanding of sports.

Thame has been doing it since 1976. He's 59 now - "old and slow," he says. But his voice still booms across the mat during matches, and he's still the self-styled "evil one" waiting for his kids after school every day.

"They know I'm going to be there," Thame said. "They know they have to deal with me every day. They know they have that stable influence, and if there is anything I can do to help them, I'll do it."

Thame has been the wrestling coach at Camden since Clarence Turner was in his fourth season as Panthers basketball coach. Since Paulsboro wrestling coach Paul Morina was a junior in high school. Since Eastern wrestling coach Bobby Ray Stinson was a figment of his parents' imagination.

"He's an inspiration," said Stinson, who won a state title at Camden Catholic in 2002. "He's dedicated himself to helping those kids day in and day out, year in and year out."

Thame said wrestling is a "disease" that he contracted as a 13-year-old in Bridgeton. He has been on the mat ever since.

"My kids asked me the other day if I ever went skiing," Thame said. "I said no because you ski in the winter time. I'm on the mat every day. There's no other place I'd rather be."

Camden went 3-3 against Eastern in matches that were wrestled. But the Panthers forfeited at the other eight weights.

That has been pretty typical for Camden through the years as Thame has tried to field competitive teams in a sport with little allure in the city.

"It's not basketball," Thame deadpanned of wrestling's status in Camden.

But Thame seems to reach a handful of Camden kids every season, a dedicated few who find something that resonates with them in the shared sacrifice, in those grueling practice sessions, in the lonely struggle in the center of the mat.

"He's after a bigger cause than winning and losing," said Camden vice principal Al Dyer, the school's former athletic director. "He's about developing young men."

Thame has coached three regional champions, the last in 1993. Another of his wrestlers, Kendalle Gibson, finished fourth in the state in 1998. His 1991 team went 14-6-1, and his 1986 team went 13-6 and finished third in the loaded Olympic American, behind South Jersey powers Highland and Paul VI.

Most of his teams have struggled for wins, because of low numbers and inexperience. But there's a three-year-old youth program in town, the Camden Wolverines, that's starting to lay the groundwork for future success, and this year's team has promising wrestlers such as junior 132-pounder Miguel Delgado, sophomore 160-pounder Khalif Pitts, and sophomore 285-pounder Andrew Stevens. All three won matches against Eastern.

"Coach makes us do hard work," said Stevens, who improved his record to 7-2.

Thame said inexperienced athletes need years to learn how to wrestle and years to learn how to win. Invariably, Camden's wrestlers run out of time.

But he's teaching a lot more than takedowns and half-nelsons. He's teaching discipline and dedication and responsibility and perhaps the greatest lesson of all: It's not whether you get knocked down but whether you get back up.

In pure win-loss terms, Thame has been knocked down more than any coach in any sport in South Jersey history.

He keeps getting back up, which might make him the biggest winner of all.